Keith Wood: Bring back rucking to save the Six Nations

Eight days left in the RBS Six Nations Championship. For a competition that
rugby supporters hold up on high this should be what life is all about. Is
it just me or is there a taste of dissatisfaction abroad?

Rucking: Keith Wood has called for a return of the ruck to help build up excitement in rugby again after a dissatisfying Six NationsPhoto: GETTY IMAGES

My joiner, a keen rugby fan and supporter of Richmond RFC in Limerick, put it harshest, saying there was times last week in the England v Ireland game when he started to read the paper, so bored had he become.

This borders on heresy, as were apparently some of my own comments on the match. My summation that it was a fairly poor game with excellent defence, three good tries and, of course, the right result for Ireland didn’t seem effusive enough for some.

But I expected Ireland to win and thought they would, with a bit to spare, so it did not rate as a great victory for me. Ireland have beaten England six out of the last seven games. They are the better team.

I also firmly believe that rugby goes in cycles, that Ireland are on the crest of a wave, that England are on their way up from the trough, and that a close victory like a couple of weeks ago will be heralded differently in leaner times in the future. In fact, I would have sold my soul for such a result when I played with Ireland.

But they were different times and I just think there is more in this Irish team. I had thought that after the quick start that Ireland would attack more but they played the percentages. They bided their time and pounced on any English mistakes. Very professional and yet a bit unfulfilling. I just feel we are missing something.

But maybe it is not with Ireland that my dissatisfaction lies; maybe it is part of greater grumblings. Welshmen are unhappy with Wales, England supporters are down in the dumps, the Scots are near suicidal, the only ones happy at the moment are the French and the Italians.

And even France are often described as efficient, which I am sure translates into something foul in French. The atmosphere at most of the games reflects this mood and has been flat this season.

Most of this moaning stems from the manner in which the game is analysed and coached and subsequently played. No criticism here of the coaches, they have a pragmatic solution to the way the game is been refereed. No criticism of the refs either, as their life is almost untenable.

The breakdown, while always a grey area, has drifted over to the dark side. There still is confusion, but the bias definitely sits with the defending side. It has become a nonsense, bad enough for those who comment on the game but nearly incomprehensible for most who watch on a Saturday.

And the most annoying element, there is almost universal agreement of how to sort it out, bring back rucking. Good, honest, rucking of people on the wrong side hurts but does little damage.

But it does make the defender think again before he tries to slow down the ball for another age as his defence gets into place. The counter-argument is that rucking looks terrible and puts parents off letting their kids play. Well, we will just have to do without those kids or rugby will cease to resemble anything we all loved to play.

This is not to say that it is all doom and gloom. There have been great moments to savour, individual bursts of life, but they are rare and with the exception of Wales probably frowned upon. Any initiative, any line break has the potential for a turnover, such are the laws at ruck time, and this has to be the biggest issue for the sport. We want to see big hits and turnovers, we want to see great defence, but as part of a great game, not the game in its entirety.

Few coaches promote all-out attacking play because it carries too much risk, when it should be the other way round. Wales are still a pleasure to watch as they have an ability to do anything at any time, but this style, which brought them two Grand Slams in three years so recently looks faintly foolish now.

And that is a disgrace, they should be lauded from the rooftops and not penalised by their own urge to play. For our beloved championship to thrive we need the laws to reward positivity not just stultifying defence.

You wait forever for a No 34 bus and then two arrive at once. Irish captain Brian O’Driscoll leads out the team for his 100th Irish cap tomorrow, 63 as captain, with 42 wins so far.

Unlike John Hayes who looked seriously confused by his time in a stadium alone as he led out his team, for O’Driscoll it is old hat. Much has already been writte about BOD. All I need to add is that Irish rugby came alive with the emergence of a rare talent; trust us to have the luck that he would be a great captain as well.